Ghanaians lack the culture of donating blood

The Head of the Korle-bu Blood Bank, Dr. Paul Mensah says Ghanaians lack the culture of donating blood for stock at the blood bank to save lives.

According to him, Ghanaians donate blood only when relations are in need of the life saving product, adding that if the blood bank is not stocked quickly, the consequences will be devastating as more people needed it to survive.

Speaking to Joy News Thursday, Dr. Mensah noted that the blood bank lacks blood to save lives considering the volume of demands that flood the bank each day.

"Ghanaians are not donating blood that is why there are no blood in the bank", the head of the blood bank intimated.

Dr. Mensah's comment was in response to reports of shortage of blood at the Korle-Bu blood bank, which is compelling health officials at the hospitals to cancel serious cases, including surgeries at the hospital.

He noted however that even though people are responding to the request to donate blood to the blood bank, the response has been encouraging.

Dr. Mensah said the requests that come from the over 50 hospitals that depend on the Korle-Bu blood bank hit 50 to 150 units of blood every day, so if more people fail to donate, the bank will still be in serious situation.

He is of the view that for the greater good of society, the public should consider the need to donate blood in order to save lives and should not be scared of the needle.

Health officials at the national blood bank say the situation could hit a major crisis if members of the public do not step in to help re-stock the blood bank, which is currently at very low levels.

Speaking to Joy News' Anna Agyapong, the Head of Laboratory at the Blood Bank, Mrs. Sheila Allotey says the situation is getting worse by the day.

"Currently, the situation is worse than before, when we went on air requesting for blood", she stressed.

Mrs. Allotey further noted that the blood bank at the moment has only 10 units of blood available for transfusion. This, she indicated is made up of 5 units of 'B' positive, 1 unit of 'B' negative, 2 units of 'O' positive and 2 units of 'AB' positive blood groups.

According to her, the bank currently lacks 'O' negative, 'AB' negative, 'A' positive and 'A' negative blood groups, even though the 'O' blood groups are high on demand with about 50 or more units requested every day.